This invention refers to a machine for automatically marking electric wires, conductors and the like, by means of one or a combination of several rings made of plastic material, provided with symbols in the form of numbers, letters and the like, designed to form wording or a reference in general.
There are known methods of marking the ends of electric wires, conductors and the like, by means of a set of plastic rings provided with numbers, letters and similar symbols according to the indications given in wiring diagrams. These marking rings are available in the form of continuous small tubes, in which the individual rings are joined together by weakened breaking portions. An operator holding a hollow needle, manually breaks off and slides the chosen rings onto the needle, according to the marking to be composed, inserts the end of the wire into the hollow needle and then transfers the composition of rings, thus formed, onto the wire. This manual method of procedure is extremely long and laborious, and can result in accidental errors.
A scope of this invention is to provide a machine for marking electric wires, conductors and the like, by means of the aforesaid marking rings, which automatically carries out all the fundamental operations of selecting, feeding, breaking off and threading the individual rings onto the hollow needle extremely rapidly, and in which the only operation which calls for the attention of the operator is that of inserting and removing the end of the wire from the aforesaid hollow needle.
A further scope of this invention is to provide a machine, as referred to above, which can be suitably programmed by the operator to automatically select the individual rings of the marking to be composed, and which is capable of memorizing the programmed sequence of operations so as to carry it out cyclically and repeatedly, without any assistance whatsoever from the operator.